


Jet Lag

by Dresupi



Category: Daredevil (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: 5+1 Things, Cell Phones, Claire Temple Deserves Better, Claire Temple is So Done, F/M, Flirting, Fluff, Getting Fired, Mild Language, Mistaken Identity, Phone Calls & Telephones, Steve Rogers has a Potty mouth, World Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-02
Updated: 2020-12-02
Packaged: 2021-03-10 06:00:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,697
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27839491
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dresupi/pseuds/Dresupi
Summary: When Claire loses her job at the hospital because of Matt's antics, she's 100% done.She's so done, in fact, that she wants to leave the country. At least temporarily.And she gets someone to sublet her apartment. That someone is Steve.AKA: Five times Steve Rogers called Claire Temple and the one time she called him.
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Claire Temple
Comments: 7
Kudos: 18





	Jet Lag

**Author's Note:**

  * For [uruvielnumenesse](https://archiveofourown.org/users/uruvielnumenesse/gifts).



She’d probably be upset about this tomorrow, but for right now, Claire was just angry. After all the shit she’d done for this place. All the doctor’s asses she’d covered. After everything, they still saw fit to fire her.

Which, yeah. She guessed that was probably a good call on their part. Matt had shown up here about four too many times, leaving without being discharged and the last time it was with her vouching for him.

And he’d run off with a bunch of medical stuff, presumably to self treat at home, but they weren’t a handout clinic, they were an ER.

She knew that.

But it still stung that they’d fired her. She covered shift after shift for these people. She supposed they’d be missing her sooner rather than later. The responsible thing would be to go find other work. She could likely get hired on at another hospital that was a short subway ride away, but really, she wanted to do something for _her_.

She deserved it after all, didn’t she? After all the shit Matt put her through and now this?

She’d been window shopping a vacation through Europe. Three months long. Yeah, a resume gap that long couldn’t be great for her future self, but she’d been working nonstop since she graduated from nursing school and she had savings. It was now or never.

Of course, she’d be stupid to leave on a whim. So she’d likely go home and grumble over it and mull it over, thinking it to death before ending up not going at all. 

And she deserved to go, right?

Right.

She definitely did.

So by the time she’d arrived home to her apartment, she made a decision. Kind of.

Not really.

She had a list of pros and cons in her head, but she didn’t have a clear deciding factor.

The pros column basically consisted of all the irresponsible reasons for wanting to go. She wanted to. She deserved to. It was a treat. Self-care was important.

The cons list was a little more like her. The resume gap was bad. Lack of income and living off savings. Bad.

Of course, once she’d jiggled the keys in the door and opened it up to find a very hurt Matt Murdock on her couch, she had yet another check in the pros column. No Matt to fuck up her life.

No Luke either.

No enhanced individuals are allowed.

Sighing, she tended to Matt’s injuries and let him sleep it off on the sofa, not bothering to tell him what he’d cost her that night because, in all actuality, she should thank him for deciding for her. 

_________

She started pricing tickets the next morning. On her sofa, which was Daredevil free, even if there was a suspicious bloodstain on her throw pillow.

Her cat, Freckles, was lazing around in a sunbeam, only getting up to move when the sunbeam moved. Freckles was the one thing she’d miss if she took a vacation. She’d have to be certain that he’d be taken care of if she went.

But, first things first, she had to shop around for the best ticket and hotel prices.

As it turned out, the plane tickets weren’t any big deal at all. Neither was booking different inns and hotels around Europe. Internet booking was nifty, and she had everything she needed on her phone. And if she lost it somehow, they’d have it at the hotel, so it wasn’t complicated.

Of course, that left the scary topic of whether or not to leave the apartment locked up, turn off the electricity and let her neighbor bring in her mail and feed Freckles. It felt weird, paying the rent for two months while she wasn’t there. An unnecessary expense that she’d rather spend on a fancy bottle of wine in Paris or a funny hat in London.

So, she opted for the oldest trick in the renter’s book. Subletting.

She called her landlord to okay it with him, and he was understandably a bit nervous about it, but when Claire promised to get the two months rent upfront from the subletter, as well as a non-refundable security deposit (she also decided to get a refundable one for herself so they wouldn’t steal her shit or anything) and leave it with him before she left, it wasn’t as big of a deal.

She put out an ad on Facebook because the only thing people used Craig’s List for nowadays was hooking up and missed connections (aka hooking up anonymously). She put the ad up before lunch and by the time she’d finished her salad, she’d had at least seven dudes who were attempting sultry faces in their profile pics and used ‘u’ for you. She told them she’d already gotten a tenant, but she couldn’t take it down until she got back to her laptop.

She was on her laptop, but they didn’t know that.

Claire was about to just take the ad down and eat the two months rent when she got another DM. This guy had what looked like a charcoal sketch of a bridge as his profile pic, and his name was Steve Rogers. The guy probably got so much shit for having the same name like Captain America, so she opted not to try to point that out. Steve was a relatively common name.

And maybe that’s why she subconsciously picked him. He didn’t try to act like he was the real Captain America or anything, he simply asked responsible questions and spelled out ‘you’ and Claire was suitably impressed. The bar was low, but whatever.

She explained that she’d be leaving in three days. Asked if that would be enough time for him to get over here.

He agreed it was short notice, but said he shouldn’t have too much trouble sticking to it.

She went over a few of the finer points of the apartment, gave him a virtual tour via the panoramic lens on her camera. She gave square footage and talked about the leaky sink in the kitchen.

They discussed Freckles, and he seemed sufficiently excited to take care of him. He told her his best friend had lots of cats, so he was pretty good around them.

She also told him she’d be locking up most of her personal items in the storage space in the basement, so she hoped that wouldn’t be a big deal to him. She wanted to make room for him.

He seemed fine with that, assured her he didn’t have anything that needed to go into storage anyway.

She asked if he could send over the two months’ rent so she could pay her landlord. She fully didn’t expect him to do that, she figured she’d have to get a hotel the last night she was in town because he’d want to give her the money in person or something.

But he didn’t seem to have an issue sending the money. He sent it over on the messenger, so she abruptly used PayPal to send it to her landlord and got a receipt back.

She sent that back to Steve and he thanked her for the place.

She also gave him her landlord’s number so he could call and talk to him since old Mr. Spellerman didn’t do Facebook. He’d only just started accepting PayPal for rent that year. He was really behind the times. But he was also older, so that made sense.

After she hung up with Steve, she spent the better part of the next three days cleaning the apartment from top to bottom. She cleared out all the old Chinese food from the fridge and only bought enough groceries for two and a half days, determined to even change the garbage bag before she left so there was nothing leftover of hers here besides the furniture.

She packed up as many of her clothes as she dared into her small carry-on suitcase, not planning on checking her luggage for anything. She was only taking her phone and her passport and her wallet beside her clothes. Less was better anyway, when country-hopping, right?

That’s what all the websites said anyway.

She locked all her valuables (ha) down in the basement storage area, and when she walked out of the apartment on the morning she was going to leave, she left nothing, not even the trash behind. She gave Freckles kisses and snuggles and belly scritches until he got bored with her attention and wandered off. Steve would be here soon, and she hoped everything would go to plan. She made a note to text him later to make sure Freckles was alright.

Claire dumped the trash out before dropping off her spare key with Mr. Spellerman. He and his wife hugged her for altogether too long and she promised to take tons of pictures to show them. 

And then she hopped into a taxi and went to the airport.

___________

LONDON

The flight wasn’t terrible. It was long, but not so long that she hated it or anything. There was a meal in flight, as well as a movie. She fell asleep during the middle of it, and someone shook her awake by ramming into the back of her chair when they got up to use the bathroom.

There was some turbulence as they touched down in London, but it wasn’t too terrible. According to everyone else.

Claire was terrified, but no one else was, so she quietly panicked while everyone else started stretching their legs and putting their things back.

They landed and she got off the plane, shouldering her carry-on and wondering how she was going to combat this jet lag because she was sort of tired and it was almost as if no time had passed. All the guidebooks she’d read had told her that she couldn’t go to sleep until eight pm.

If she went back to the hotel room, she was definitely going to sleep.

That truth was cemented when she got there and saw how cozy the room in the inn was.

She dropped off most of her stuff and decided to go sight-seeing or at least get something to eat. Claire made it as far as the restaurant down the street from the inn before she was too tired to walk anymore.

The smell of fryer oil seemed to help wake her up a bit when she stepped into the restaurant. Judging by the brown paper spread out in front of all the patrons and the decadent smell of fried fish and potatoes, she’d found one of London’s many fish and chip restaurants.

Claire sat down and looked at the menu, unsure of what to buy, but when it came to her turn to order, she just asked for the first thing on the menu. Along with a soda.

She received her food in a packet of brown paper and was directed to a clean table to eat. There were ketchup and malt vinegar on the table and she used a bit of both, remembering this from one of those shows she watched on Netflix. She’d seen fish and chips eaten, as well as Scotch eggs, so she knew how to eat both of those things.

It was delicious in a wonderfully different sort of way. She’d had her share of fried food in America, obviously, but this was good as well. In a way that was decidedly not American. She liked that.

After she finished, she had a bit more energy on her trek back to the hotel.

By the time she got to her room, however, she was almost delirious with fatigue. Or she had been this whole time and her brief lulls into consciousness was actually fever dreams.

But she had the ketchup stain on her jeans where she’d dropped a chip, so she figured she had actually eaten the fish and chips.

She collapsed on her bed and fell asleep almost immediately.

She awoke after the sun rose, but decidedly earlier than she usually rose. Her phone was ringing, so he reached for it, answering it before she realized what she was doing.

“Hello?”

There was silence for a split second and then a voice. Deep voice. Brooklyn accent. “Is this Claire Temple?”

“The one and only,” she countered, audibly yawning.

“Oh sorry… did I wake you up? What time is it there?”

She glanced at the clock. Seven-thirty. “Not too early. Who is this?”

‘Oh sorry, it’s Steve. Steve Rogers? I’m subletting your apartment.”

“Oh right…” She sat up and stretched. “What can I do for you/ Is there a problem? Is Freckles alright?”

“Freckles is fine, he’s a sweet cat. But there’s just a small problem,” he said. “Just the smallest ever. I promise I’ll leave you alone after this.”

“Okay,” she said with a chuckle.

“The toilet…”

“What about it?”

“Is there a special way to flush it? Because I’ve had to call the super like four times and I’m starting to get embarrassed.”

Claire clapped her hand over her mouth. “God, I forgot. Right. So you have to jiggle the handle or it won’t flush everything. Sorry about that.”

“Nah, it’s fine. Honestly, a working toilet in Hell’s Kitchen is pretty amazing.”

Claire laughed. “You’re telling me.”

“Alright sorry to bother you. I’m gonna go…”

“Thanks. Steve, right?”

“Yes. Steve. Rogers.” 

“Claire,” she replied. 

“I know,’ he said, sounding like he was grinning. “I remember.”

“Oh right. Well, have a good one.”

“Will do. I won’t bother you again.”

“You still haven’t bothered me,” she assured him. “Is it alright if I text you from time to time for Freckles-updates?”

“Text away,” he replied.

She was grinning when she hung up. He sounded cute. Lots of people sounded cute. It was a matter of IF he was as cute as he sounded. In her experience, they usually were. Sounding cute did a lot for someone’s aesthetic appeal.

She rolled over in bed and turned on the television.

_______________

PARIS

She was walking down the streets of Paris the next time he called.

Claire had just gotten finished eating what was a positively enormous dinner. At least, it put her midnight Hot Pocket dinners while pulling a double at the hospital to shame.

She was so worried she was going to belch in front of all these elegant Parisians, that she almost yelped when her phone rang. She didn’t though, she held it together long enough to answer it, smiling already because she’d recognized his number in her phone.

“Hello?”

“Hey… it’s Steve again. Back on my bullshit.”

She laughed. “Uh-oh, what did you break this time?”

“Haha, nothing this time. But your neighbor upstairs did have a helluva leak. There was significant water damage on the wall where your TV used to be.”

“Used to be?”

“I got it down before the wall crumbled.”

“Oh good,” she said, her hand to her chest. “Where is it now?”

“On the couch, but as soon as they get the new drywall up, I’ll reinstall it for you.”

“Thanks, you’re the best,” she said with a grin that was probably apparent in her voice, but she didn’t care. She liked talking to Steve. She liked how he swore almost always, and with that Brooklyn accent too.

She’d never really liked that accent before, but she found she did like it now. Maybe it was sharing it so much. Or maybe it was Steve.

“Was that the reason you called?” she asked. 

“No, actually. I was going to paint the wall for you and I wanted to know which color you wanted. The same one that’s on it now, or maybe something else? An accent wall?”

“Oh, um…” she thought about it for a long moment. She wasn’t sure, but she was fairly certain that she couldn’t tell Steve just to ‘surprise her’. That kind of thing was probably weird.

_“What color paint would you like on the wall of the apartment I’m subletting from you?”_

_“Oh, you know… a color. Surprise me.”_

God, that sounded idiotic.

“Let me look at some paint samples online and I’ll get back to you,” she said.

“Awesome, you have my number?”

“Yeah, I’ll save it on my phone.”

“Aww,” he said, clearly grinning. “All that for little old me?”

“Yep. Little old you, and my new accent wall. And you know… Freckles updates.”

He laughed and so did Claire. 

“Did you want to get another update? I know I sent you pics earlier…”

“If you want, I mean… I’m never going to say no to pics of my cat.”

He chuckled. “I’ll take some after I hang up.”

“Cool.”

“So, not to keep you, but where are your right now?” he asked. 

Paris,” she replied. “Been here for a few days.”

“You like it?” he asked.

“So much,” she replied. “I’m homesick, but I’m loving France. Thinking about extending my stay and going to Nice or Bordeaux?”

“If you stay, promise me you’ll go see the Palace of Versailles,” he said. “Maybe after you’ve chosen your paint color, but yeah…”

She laughed. “Have you been?” she asked.

“Only once. Years ago. Didn’t get to do much sightseeing, but I always wanted to.”

“I’ll go to Versaille,” she promised. “I’ll take lots of pictures for you.”

“Thanks,” he said. “That’s nice of you.”

“No, if I took pictures in Nice, it’d be nice of me,” she countered.

“O-ho, see what you did there,” he said, laughing.

“Yeah, it sounded better in my head,” she admitted.

“Well, it sounded pretty good on my end,” he said.

“Now you’re being the nice one.”

“Have a good one, Claire. Have fun in France.”

“Thanks, Steve.”

After he hung up, she sort of wished they could have talked for longer. He was fun to talk to on the phone. And she didn’t even like phone calls usually.

_It’s probably the fact that you know nothing about the man other than he’s staying in your apartment while you’re not there._

Shush, inner voice. Let me be romantic for a little while.

She was in the city of love, after all. How could she help it?

Continuing her walk back to her hotel, she was breathing deeply before stopping outside a patisserie shop, her eye on a rather gorgeous delicacy. It had raspberries and puff pastry.

Mille Feuille.

She wanted that.

She could have that.

She grinned and went into the shop.

____________________

MUNICH

Claire lay back on her bed and stared at the ceiling. Her television was on at the foot of the bed, but she wasn’t watching it, she just had it on for the sound. She’d been awake for a while now and was happily awaiting the minutes to tick away so she could go out for breakfast.

Her phone started buzzing on the side table where it was charging and she rolled over to check who it was. She was surprised to see Steve’s name show up on the screen. She’d just had a texting conversation with him earlier that day to check with Freckles, and they’d sort of small talked for a little bit after. She’d sent a picture of the view from her hotel room and he’d sent one of the view of her neighbor across the alley. He was cooking shirtless and it was _not_ a good look on him. The neighbor. Not Steve. She still didn’t know what Steve looked like yet. It felt almost rude to ask for a picture.

But that had been a few hours ago. But now he was calling? 

She hoped nothing was wrong.

She answered quickly, probably sounding a little bit breathless. “Hello?”

There was no answer, just some muffled sounds and she could hear someone talking.

“Steve?’ she asked, straining to listen. She recognized the voice in the background.

“Hello? Steve?” she tried again just as the voice’s owner dawned on her. Jimmy Fallon.

He was watching Jimmy Fallon. And she was hearing it from her pocket because he was butt-dialing. Or pocket dialing. Or whatever. It wasn’t time for the late show in the states, but you could also watch Jimmy on Youtube, so he was likely doing that.

Sighing, she stayed on the line for a couple more seconds just to make sure everything was alright and then hung up, feeling a bit more disappointed than she’d expected.

She’d sort of gotten all excited when she saw his name. Well, she’d been scared something was wrong at first, but once she’s realized he was only butt dialing, it became more of a disappointment than anything.

If not an emergency, she’d sort of gotten used to him calling her every couple of weeks, and knowing that he hadn’t this time felt a little bit… disappointing.

She sighed and set the phone back down on the side table, allowing the screen to go black and back to charging. She went back to her original position of laying on the bed, taking a deep breath and letting it out again.

Her phone buzzed again. A shorter buzz this time, and she glanced over to see a text from Steve on her screen.

_“I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to call you earlier!”_

She laughed and pulled her phone back into her hands once more to reply, “Don’t worry about it. Nothing’s wrong, I take it?”

“Nothing except my ass called you. Sorry about that.”

“Maybe next time your head could call me? I think it’s a better conversationalist,” she teased.

He didn’t reply for a few minutes, but the three dots kept flashing at the bottom. Claire hoped she hadn’t overstepped some boundary. They’d kind of been flirty the past few times they’d interacted. Mostly on text, because it was easier to be flirty via text when you could blame a misunderstanding on the medium… or maybe she was just too much of a coward to flirt with a man she didn’t even know what he looked like.

“You don’t mind if I call you?” he asked.

“Not at all,” she replied.

“Okay, well… I might do it more often. Only if it’s not bothering you.”

“Dude. It’s not. Why do you think I said that?”

He sent a smiling emoji. “Expect a call from me then. First chance I get. I’m heading out right now but I’ll call you as soon as I possibly can.”

“Okay,” she replied. “Be sure that you do, okay?”

“Yes ma’am,” he replied.

“Have a good night.”

“You too, Claire.”

She smiled and replaced the phone once more on her bedside table, a smile on her face as she went to slip her shoes on. It was breakfast time.

MADRID

  


By the time he called her again, she was in another country. Madrid.

And when he called, he sounded tight and worried.

“Everything okay, Steve?”

“No, actually…” he said. “I have to go away for a few weeks. But don’t worry about Freckles, my friend’s going to come by and feed her. If that’s okay? She’s really trustworthy. And she loves cats.”

“Yeah, that’s fine, I mean… are you okay?”

“I wasn’t expecting to get called away this summer, but it looks like it’s happening anyway.”

“Sorry about that,” she said.

“No, I’m sorry. I’m the one who promised to call and then when I do it’s like this… I’m sorry, Claire. I’ll call you first thing when I get back? Where will you be next month?”

“Let me think…” she said, doing the mental math and coming up with Rome.

“Rome,” she said.

“Perfect. I’ll talk to you when you’re in Rome.”

“Who’s your friend who’s looking after Freckles?” she asked.

“Oh. Nat. She’s great. She has three cats of her own, so she’ll take really good care of Freckles.”

“Cool. Thanks so much for setting that up. You really didn’t have to.”

“Yeah, I did. I told you I’d be the one taking care of your cat and your place and then I get called away…” he trailed off and sighed. “Thanks for being so cool about it.”

“No problem. And I get a call in a few weeks?”

“When you’re in Rome,” he replied.

“Great. I’ll look forward to it.”

“Take tons of pictures.”

“I will. I updated my cloud storage. I can take as many as I want.”

“Cool,” he said with a laugh. “Have fun, Claire.”

“You too,” she said. “Or… be careful, Steve.”

He let out a sound that sounded like a sigh. “Thank you. I will.”

‘Good.”

“Well. Take care, Claire.”

“I will, Steve.”

“Okay… goodbye.”

“Bye,” she replied, feeling more than a little sad when he hung up.

She’d sort of been wanting to hear from him before this, and when she did, she wasn’t expecting to hear him tell her he was going out of town. He said his friend was going to come to feed her cat. Nat, her name was. Claire had to wonder if she was a girlfriend or something. But he’d seemed happy to call her for no reason. He’d told her he’d call her first thing when he got back in a few weeks, so that was a good thing, wasn’t it?

She took a deep breath and nodded to herself. It was fine. This was fine. Even if he had a girlfriend, he was still fun to talk to and would perhaps make a great friend. She wasn’t sure why she was jealous when she didn’t even know the guy from Adam. 

Well, she knew more of him than from Adam because she was staying in her apartment, but that was beside the point.

She pushed her phone into her back pocket and decided to go back out for dinner instead of getting room service. The food here was exemplary, and she wanted a little more of it.

____________

ROME

She’d been in Rome for two days when he finally called. She’d sort of given up on him calling, actually, she wasn’t really in the business of waiting around for guys when they broke their promises, so it surprised the fuck out of her when his name showed up on the screen of her phone within a day of when he’d told her he’d be calling. Hell, she was about to be leaving for home in a few days. It was lucky he called when he did.

“Steve,” she said, grinning widely as she took a seat on a stone bench.

“Claire,” he replied and his voice sounded light, so she hoped he was grinning. She could always ask for a video call one of these times, but she was headed back to London in three days, and from there, back to New York.

“You’re okay?” she asked. “In one piece?”

‘As far as I can tell, yeah,” he said with a grin. “I talked to Nat, she said she came round to feed Freckles while I was gone. Said he was a good cat.”

“He _is_ a good cat,’ Claire said with a laugh.

“I’m not arguing, I’m only relaying the message.”

“So Nat…” Claire said slowly. “Is she a girlfriend or—“

‘No,” Steve said quickly. “No, no. No.” He laughed. “It’s not that I would never date Natasha in another life, but she’s sort of interested in the opposite of me. I mean, you’d have a better chance with her than I would.’

“Oh,” Claire said. “OH. Right. Got it.”

“I mean… are you? I could give you her number and when you get back—“

“I’m sure she’s a lovely person, and I could possibly be into her if I’d met her before I met someone else.” She swallowed quickly and hoped like hell he’d read into it the way she wanted.

“You met someone? In Rome? Or maybe Madrid? France?”

Claire laughed. “No. No one who resides in another country. I’ve only met one person since I’ve left the states actually… if you count our phone calls.”

“Do you?”

“Yes,” she said, laughing. “That’s my roundabout way of saying it’s you.”

“Me?” he said, chuckling. “I”m flattered. And I would love to take you up on a meet and greet when you get back…” he trailed off.

“What?” she asked.

“It’s just… you haven’t seen me. And I haven’t seen you…”

“Facetime?” she asked boldly.

“Facetime,” he repeated. “Yes. Yes, let’s do that.”

“Right now?” she asked, grinning widely.

“Yeah, right now.”

“Hold on…”

She pulled her phone back to press the facetime button and she grinned when it loaded and she could see him on the screen. Well, she grinned at first, but then her mouth fell open.

“Wait… you’re _the_ Steve Rogers?” she asked.

“You didn’t know,” he stated. “See, I thought you might not know…”

“You’ve got such a foul mouth for America’s premier hero,” she said with a laugh.

“I’m a Brooklyn boy,” he said in way of explanation, and she laughed.

“Yes. Yes, you are.”

“You’re…” he trailed off. “You’re really pretty, Claire.”

“Thank you,” she said with a grin. “Thank you… that’s… I mean… that’s…

“Are you still up for a meet and greet when you get back?” he asked.

“One-hundred percent yes,” she replied, beaming into the phone.

“Cool, I can… I can pick you up from the airport?” he offered.

“Yes, that’d be… that’d be really great. I mean, if you aren’t busy next Wednesday…”

“Even if I was, I’d clear my schedule,” he said softly, smiling.

“Okay. Okay… Okay, so I’ll see you next Wednesday?”

“It’s a date,” he said. “I mean, a preliminary date. I’d never subject you to a first date while you’re jet-lagged.”

She laughed. “I’m pretty sure I could make it work if needed.”

“I’ve got a sneaking suspicion this will work out and we’ll get to have that first date,” he replied.

“Me too…”

A meow sounded in the speakers and Steve laughed. “Freckles wants to say hi.”

“Oh!” Claire grinned widely and waved into the phone. “Hello, Freckles-baby!”

Her cat rubbed against the phone and meowed.

“I’ll be back next week, baby, I miss you,” she said, blowing a kiss as Steve reappeared on the screen

“I’d better go feed her before she starts thinking I’ve kidnapped you and am holding you hostage on my phone.”

She laughed. “Yeah, you’d better. I’ll see you Wednesday.’

“Wednesday,” he repeated.

“Bye, Steve Rogers.”

“Bye, Claire Temple.”

__________

NEW YORK

Once the plane touched back down in NYC, Claire found herself getting all nervous again. But not because of turbulence or the bumpy landing at JFK or anything like that. It was because Steve had instructed her to call him when she got here, so he’d know to start looking for her outside. He didn’t want to miss her or cause her any undue stress, so he’d already told her he’d be wearing a heavy gray sweater.

She guessed she was so used to being an afterthought that it was a little disconcerting to be someone’s priority.

So she grabbed her carry on and then ventured out to baggage claim to grab her suitcase. She made her way over to customs and went through the whole rigamarole there before she even thought about anything else. Or before she allowed herself to, anyway.

That’s when she pulled out her phone to call Steve.

It struck her as a little odd that this was the first outgoing call she had to this number. She’d been doing a lot of texting Steve for sure, but it was weird that this was the first time she was actually calling him. He’d called her the rest of the time himself.

He answered on the second ring and sounded a little breathless.

“Hello?” he said.

“Hello yourself,” she said with a grin.

“Hey, Claire. You just get in?”

“I actually just got my suitcase, so I should be coming out in a few minutes.”

“Oh?” he said. “I’m out here waiting. No easy feat. Do you know how many autographs I had to give to get a spot outside to wait for you?”

She laughed. “You did that for me?”

“Of course,” he said with a chuckle. “You deserve the star treatment, right?”

“I literally just got back from Europe, so…”

“So?” he countered. “You are still wearing the purple hoodie?”

“Yep,” she said, “Just walked out the door and I’m looking around.

“I see you,” he said. “I’m over by the black sedan.”

She squinted and saw him, waving from outside a shiny black sedan, and started to walk towards him. She grinned and pulled her suitcase along behind her.

He jogged over to take her suitcase and bag from her. “Hey,” he said, grinning in a way that made her heart flutter. Oh, this boy was too cute for his own good.

He loaded her suitcases into the trunk and then stood back and looked at her. “Is it too forward to ask for a hug?” he asked.

“Not at all,” she said, stepping into it as he wrapped two beefy arms around her. They stood like that for a long moment. Until someone honked their horn to hurry them up.

Then, they hopped into the car and he started to pull out of the airport.

“So Freckles is very suspicious of me,” he said. “Ever since I let her talk to you on the phone, she thinks I’ve got you hidden somewhere and keeps looking for you.”

“Aww,” Claire laughed. “I was going to suggest coffee before home, but maybe I can head there first?”

“I don’t think she’ll begrudge you a quick caffeine fix.”

“I do have to stay up if I”m going to get rid of the jet lag…”

“I can help with that,” Steve said with a grin.

“I bet you can.”

As they left for coffee, Claire couldn’t believe her good luck. Not only did she get a full three months of personal time, but she got a move-on-from-Matt-free card and she was gonna play it immediately, dammit.

Now if she could only find the ‘Share the Wealth’ card or the redraw career card, then this would be perfect.

Oh well. One perfection at a time.


End file.
